CONGRESS DECIDES 169
ful examination of the different routes which the canal
might take. " Differing in this respect from the other
sections, its functions were of a more general kind, as
it had to discuss each project from an engineering point
of view, to indicate the advantages and drawbacks of
each, and fix what each would cost, both for construc-
tion and annual maintenance."
The last committee was one of ways and means and
was required to elaborate the work of the second com-
mittee.
This is not the place to describe the proceedings of
the committees and the Congress as a whole in any
detail; but we may usefully review, as De Lesseps does
himself, " the general considerations which were sub-
mitted to the international jury, and received its
approval."
The Statistical Committee called for a report from
M. Fontane, the Secretary-General of the Suez Canal
Company, who proved that an annual traffic of six
million tons was only possible in a canal through which
fifty ships could pass in twenty-four hours, and he
added: " This was why it was necessary in making
the Suez Canal to adopt the system of a canal on one
level without locks or drawbacks, to the exclusion of
several very ingenious and bold plans presented by
engineers of great repute."
M. Simonin, the reporter of the second committee,
summed up the advantages of new markets and new
traffic which would result from the cutting of the canal,
and what distances would be saved to navigators.
" From France and England, that is to say, from Liver-
pool, Havre, Nantes, and Bordeaux, the distance to